⁷You husbands in the same way, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with someone weaker, since she is a woman; and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered.

Husbands have the more difficult job, in some ways! Marriage principles are not black and white, with all the specifics laid out. Scripture gives husbands and wives powerful principles, but they are general. In Ephesians, husbands are told to love their wives the way Christ loved the church. That command is fairly broad and open-ended, limited only by a man’s imagination, the extent of his love, and his study of how Christ loved us and sacrificed Himself for us. A husband could even take this principle so far as to serve his wife by washing her feet.

Here Peter instructs husbands to work at understanding their wives and modifying their behavior toward them accordingly. That can be extremely difficult for men, because it requires studying their wives, listening to them. Yet this instruction carries the same weight as in 1 Peter 2:3, where we should submit ourselves to every human institution. In other words, Christian husbands should not only focus on the biblical principles of marriage, but act on them—and that means submitting themselves to their wives’ weaknesses.

In our conservative churches today, we take great pride in affirming biblical gender roles and resisting the cultural trend toward egalitarianism of the sexes. But that is not enough. Peter tells us to not just talk about these principles but to do something about them. And for husbands, that means treating their wives with great honor. Nothing violates the Bible’s teaching on marriage more than for a man to reduce marriage roles down to “I am the head of my wife, because Scripture says so—therefore, she should submit to me.” Nowhere does God tell husbands to make their wives submit. Rather, husbands are to love their wives and treat them with great honor.

What does it mean when Peter refers to the wife as “someone weaker”? Men typically are bigger and stronger than women. But it is also true that men can use their emotional strength to dominate women. We avoid wrestling with this further, noting that Peter assumes a common knowledge about these things. In a Christian marriage, a man must not use his strength to repress his wife but to honor her as a “fellow heir of the grace of life.” That was revolutionary in Peter’s day, whether in Jewish culture or the Roman and Greek culture. And that is his teaching about submission within the human institution of marriage.

Lord, thank You for giving us guiding principles for God-honoring marriages. Help me love my spouse as Your Word outlines.